Zone Defense

At Family Council yesterday we kicked off the idea of “zones.” Simply put, each child has a zone to clean BEFORE they are allowed to watch TV, play video games, or do anything “fun.” (They also have a few other things to attend to before “fun time” but this article is about zones.)  One benefit of this is the cross-training that will ensue as the rotating zone include some gender-specific jobs that really aren't  For example, it has been our only son's job  to take out the inside trash for the last eight years, but he doesn't know how to load the dishwasher.  This morning Kara taught him this skill and I showed Natalie the fine art of trash collection and liner replacement.

The benefits notwithstanding, it isn't going well so far. I suppose it will take some getting used to. In no particular order, one child clandestinely arose at 5:30 a.m. and began playing video games without doing the zone or anything else. (This child did later do a good job on the zone with only minor complaint.) Maybe tonight I will hide the controllers. Another child arose five minutes before another scheduled commitment and left in a rush without doing anything. A third did it, very grudgingly and with parental duress and accompaniment. The other child slept in until forced 10:30 reveille and only did the work under extreme parental coercion. 

I guess that part of the problem is that we are unwilling to enforce the punishment in every case (like, "you cant go") or the easily enforceable TV ban is not enough of a motivator.

Another part of the problem is that their mother is not only cleanliness-obsessed, she is also very cleanliness-gifted. She could do your zone in five minutes and it would be better than you could do with two hours and a half dozen illegal aliens. We understand that the big picture here is not necessarily to clean the house, but to raise children, but it hard when you get the “showing” call as we did today after a 37-day hiatus.